1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus such as a personal computer, and more particularly to an information processing apparatus capable of editing electronic data.
2. Description of the Related Art
Hitherto, there has been generally known a process of reading a document in the form of paper by a scanner and outputting read image data to a printer, while adding a retouch instruction and treatment instructions such as duplex printing, stapling, punching, etc.
It has also been generally known to convert document data prepared using an application stored in an information processing apparatus to electronic data that does not depend on the application used for preparing the data, and to output the electronic data to a printer while adding treatment instructions such as duplex printing, stapling, punching, etc.
Further, a technique of taking in plural groups of document data prepared using plural kinds of application software, and converting the document data to electronic data that does not depend on the applications used for preparing the data has been generally known. The electronic data includes a plurality of drawing objects, and a user can make editing, such as deletion, on the desired drawing object.
In execution of the editing, a plurality of drawing objects are often edited together to increase efficiency of the editing operation. With one generally known technique, when the user designates a selection range by using an input unit, e.g., a mouse, a plurality of drawing objects included in the selection range are all selected. Then, when the user executes a desired editing process while holding the selected state, a plurality of drawing objects can be edited together.
In editing a plurality of drawing objects, it is also generally known to change the order in which the drawing object are overlapped with each other. Such an editing process is generally executed by a method of selecting an object which is to be changed in the overlapping order, and moving the selected object to the front side or the rear side of the other object(s). The “move-to-forefront side” function of moving the selected object to the forefront side and the “move-to-rearmost side” function of moving the selected object to the rearmost side are further generally known.
When objects are overlapped with each other and an object on the rear side is completely hidden, the user cannot see the rear-side object on a screen image displayed. A technique for efficiently editing the objects in such a state is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 08-272993. According to an information processing apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 08-272993, in the state of objects overlapping one another, when the user clicks a mouse at a position where the hidden drawing object exists, the hidden object is selected and displayed on the forefront side.
With the information processing apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 08-272993, however, there is a risk that when many objects are overlapped, an object not demanded by the user may be selected and displayed on the forefront side.
One example of problems caused in editing a plurality of drawing objects together will be described below with reference to FIG. 33. FIG. 33 shows a state where groups of table objects in the table format overlap. Each table object group appears as one object on a preview of a general application. In fact, however, the table object group is formed by a plurality of drawing objects, such as rectangle objects 3302 and text objects 3303. In other words, when a general application is used to output an object which is not expressed with a drawing function, such as a table, to a printer driver, etc., an assembly of plural drawing objects is output.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-91518 discloses a system similar to that shown FIG. 1 attached herewith. With the description in that publication, a general application selects an electronic original (document) writer as an output destination, and drawing data prepared by the general application is output to a bookbinding application via the electronic original writer. Also in the disclosed system, for an object which is not expressed with a drawing function, the general application outputs an assembly of plural drawing objects. Therefore, the electronic original writer converts individual drawing objects, which constitute the assembly of drawing objects, to data for the bookbinding application, and outputs the converted data to the bookbinding application. Accordingly, when the bookbinding application edits the bookbinding application-adapted data prepared by the electronic original writer, it has to edit the drawing objects individually as shown in FIG. 33. On that occasion, one solution for efficiently executing the editing operation is to select the table object group intended by the user and to edit them together.
When the user selects and edits a table object group 3300, the user designates a selection range 3305 including the entirety of the table object group 3300. Rectangle objects and text objects in the table object group 3300 surrounded by the selection range 3305 are put into a selected state and selection handles are displayed. By executing the editing while holding that selected state, the editing is reflected on the rectangle objects and the text objects in the selected state. Because of the rectangle objects and the text objects in the selected state being all edited, when a “move” process is executed as one example of the editing, the editing result is obtained as indicated by 3307 and 3308. More specifically, the selection range 3305 designated by the user further includes rectangle objects and text objects forming a table object group 3301 which is not intended as a selection target by the user. This means that some rectangle objects and text objects not intended by the user are also put into the selected state as indicated by 3306. As a result of the “move” process, therefore, the rectangle objects and the text objects not intended by the user are also moved together. This causes a drawback that, when a desired drawing object is selected in the state of plural drawing object groups overlapping each other, the user is required to carefully select the desired drawing object in consideration of other drawing objects on the rear side, which are not visually recognized on a screen image displayed. This can make such operations difficult or time consuming.